So I just need an excuse to bake – and there’s nothing that calls for a cake more than family milestones 
For this pair, I used a cream cheese pound cake base, smothered with some rich buttercream frosting and finally topped off with vanilla fondant. Instead of actually kneading the fondant, this time I just used a fine-point brush and painted on designs and colours.
On another note, I’m uber-excited about taking my very first professional cake decorating classes this Spring/Summer! Golda’s Kitchen (a.k.a baker’s heaven) offers PME Professional Diploma Courses at their retail store in Mississauga and I couldn’t be more thrilled to sign up. So far, I’ll be taking up the ‘Rolled Fondant’ and ‘Royal Icing and Piping’ modules – as and when they announce their next dates for ‘Sugar Flowers 1 & 2′, I’ll be first in line to join! Can’t wait to see what’s in store.
For now, it’s back to my current project. I picked up some wonderful books from my local library and I’m compiling a hand-written recipe book of my favourite picks. Call me old-school, but there’s just something about using hand-written recipes that can’t be replaced by print-outs. Besides, now I have an excuse to get myself some shiny new stationery…bliss 
These are the books I’ve found so far, feel free to drop in more suggestions!
Over and out..for now at least.
No Comments March 8th, 2010
So I decided to step out of my chocolate-y world and experiment with a new ingredient today! Lemons are such an easy way to add life to any food; I find myself adding a dash of freshly squeezed lemon juice to most of meals on a daily basis, just to give them that extra zing factor.
Kudos to the lovely Barefoot Contessa (aka Ina Garten) for this recipe. The original was designed for lemon bars, but I couldn’t help tweaking it up a bit and made my very first lemon tarts.
Ingredients
For the crust:
- 1/2 pound unsalted butter, at room temperature
- 1/2 cup granulated sugar
- 2 cups flour
- 1/8 teaspoon kosher salt
For the filling:
- 6 extra-large eggs at room temperature
- 3 cups granulated sugar
- 2 tablespoons grated lemon zest (4 to 6 lemons)
- 1 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
- 1 cup flour
- Confectioners’ sugar, for dusting
Directions
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
For the crust, cream the butter and sugar until light in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Combine the flour and salt and, with the mixer on low, add to the butter until just mixed. Dump the dough onto a well-floured board and gather into a ball. Flatten the dough with floured hands and press it into a 9 by 13 by 2-inch baking sheet, building up a 1/2-inch edge on all sides. Chill.
Bake the crust for 15 to 20 minutes, until very lightly browned. Let cool on a wire rack. Leave the oven on.
For the filling, whisk together the eggs, sugar, lemon zest, lemon juice, and flour. Pour over the crust and bake for 30 to 35 minutes, until the filling is set. Let cool to room temperature.
(Taken from the Food Network)
I must add here, I found it easier to knead the dough with my hands as opposed to using an electric beater – besides, you’re going to get your hands messy pressing it into the baking tin in any case, so why not? The batter can be used wholly for squares or tarts, but in my case, I wanted a bit of both, so I used half the batter and crust dough to fill a standard loaf-tin; the other half was divided out to make little tarts in a cupcake baking pan.
For garnishing, you can top off the bars with a dollop of fresh whipping cream, ( or vanilla ice-cream) and sprinkle some grated lemon zest just to give your guests a teaser of the tangy flavors to follow!
Happy Baking
No Comments February 11th, 2010
A big thank you to Jamie Oliver for this awesome and easy recipe!
(Diary entry from my trip to Milano, Italy, Summer ‘95. I always knew I loved writing!)
On my first trip to Italy, we visited the Italian Friday Market which was located in San Donato, right across Dee’s house. We went on the terrace and watched the market being set up, very early morning, at about 4.30-5 am. We decided to visit it before lunch because it used to be closed at 1pm. We got ready to go. We didn’t need the car, because the MArket was just across the road. It was at least 1 or 2 km long. We went down and walked around. Some of the shops were closing because we came at around 12.30. I was intending on buying some jewelry and clothes for myself. Although I window-shopped the whole market but I didn’t find any jewelry or good clothes. Finally Dee spotted in the distance, a small, cozy and messy stall that was selling toys, clothes, jewelry and many other things. I found a dress right at the back, which was for 40,000 Lira. Mama said it was too expensive so we didn’t buy it. I, with a long face walked lazily with Mama and company. There, in front of my eyes , I saw a lovely dress which had the best colours and patterns I had ever seen, in the whole, wide world, was now in somebody elses hands. I wanted and longed for it all my life. It was very very unfortunately the last piece, for the shop was about to close. We went back home and I wrote my diary. And when I went into the bedroom, to my surprise, lay the lost twin of the dress I spotted in the marketplace. Mama told me that she was the one who asked that woman to pick up the dress from that shop, drop it over to our house to give me a surprise. I wore the dress nearly every night for the 2 weeks of our stay.
No Comments January 27th, 2010
I know I haven’t been writing a whole lot lately; with the exception of the occasional recipe, attempted chef-like activities or photos, I haven’t really felt the urge to write anything of substance. So, after having this box open for an hour, and fighting continuous battles against the bum in me, I’ve summed up some courage to make slightly-more-than-half-hearted attempt at blogging.
When I started my blog, writing used to come naturally. I would see/hear/feel something, and immediately feel a rush of excitement charging my fingertips to just…write. Regardless of the content, topic of discussion, mood or time of day, I wrote. One self-indulgent narration after the other somehow seemed to entertain my audience, and I enjoyed being able to express myself through this medium of communication.
After a couple of life-changing events, the ‘emo’, frenzied writer in me somehow gave way to a different person – an adult, perhaps? For one thing, stepping into my first job, that too at a government office killed most of my creativity. As progressive and un-government-insitution-like my office is, it still transforms each one of its occupants into zombie-like-robots, if there is such a thing. Furthermore, office lingo aka formalized language which is constantly scrutinized and subject to HR’s approval, is definitely a killjoy for bloggers. Life somehow becomes serious, and that sucks big time.
Why the realization, you ask? Applying for grad school, or Masters, as many call it. Why do they refer to it as a “Masters” degree in any case? Who, better than yourself, can judge whether or not you are the Master of something anyway? Do you really need to a)drain your wallet and move mountains just trying to submit an application, b), endure another 2 years of academic abuse, as if undergrad wasn’t enough c)still come out unemployed and *really* broke this time at the end of it…just to become the “Master” of a particular field?
Off topic. Back to this post. The realization of this inability to write has been a long time coming, but applying to grad school really triggered it. Case in point, letter of intent. While researching how to write the ‘best’ letter of intent, I bookmarked a couple of interesting websites:
- University of Waterloo: Career Services guide to a Personal Statement/Letter of Intent
- University of California: Tips for a Graduate School Statement
- The University of New Mexico: Statement of Intent
On its own, each tip sheet seems great, and I do admit, I definitely used some pointers here and there. However, and not to undermine any one of the 3 institutions, but when you put ‘em all together, they were a whole bunch of contradictions! If you do have the time to read them, you’ll see what I mean.
Anyhow, the bottom line is, a personal statement is ‘personal’ because it is, in fact, unique to the person writing it. There aren’t, and cannot be set rules or guidelines to dictate how you should present your ‘intentions’ or personal experiences, because no two people have those things in common. Just keep your eyes on the prize, and write what your heart tells you to, more than what the mind expects you to. When you truly feel it all come together, it’ll magically flow out in writing.
At least that’s what I did, and that’s exactly how it felt: the bliss that arises from penning down heartfelt mumbo-jumbo. It was probably just the candy induced sugar-rush, but writing that letter of intent somehow really felt like magic.
And I think I just felt it again.
No Comments January 7th, 2010 Tags: montréal |
No Comments January 5th, 2010 Tags: métro, montréal |
Even after all this time
The sun never says to the earth,
“You owe Me.”
Look what happens with
A love like that,
It lights up the Whole Sky.
- Hāfez of Shiraz
No Comments December 11th, 2009
One of the biggest reasons why I make the conscious decision to come to work everyday.
No Comments December 3rd, 2009
Presenting to you, my first ever fondant cake!
The cake itself was just a plain vanilla sponge cake, baked in a rectangle pan. The sleeves were cut out of a loaf-tin, carved out into semi-circle shapes and attached on to the main body. As you can see, the cake was an attempt to create a Manchester United jersey…and any fan knows that their jersey is red, and hey, the cake looks pretty red in this image. The truth is, it was actually…pink!
Let’s re-trace back to what happened behind the scenes. I used Satin Ice white fondant, very conveniently delivered to my doorstep from Golda’s Kitchen (great resource for bakers, located in Mississauga). The texture was awesome, felt very much like play-dough, and I worked it for a good 6 hours and it never failed me; however, the dilemma arose when I added red food colouring to the fondant, only to realize it would never actually become red! It took approximately 6 hours of constant kneading and rolling and re-kneading for the colour to remotely look like a shade of rose pink, at which point I gave up – hey, I had a deadline to work with. The result was a barbie pink Manchester United jersey, not to mention, hands and baking utensils all glowing an odd shade of pink. Sigh.
Yes, I have learnt my lesson! After having researched a couple of tips online, gum-paste colour is said to be ideal for fondant or pastry, and usually, a darker cherry-tone of red works best with white fondant. Lucky for me, the fondant was strong enough to withstand 3 bottles of red colouring added to it and never lost its elasticity. At the end of the day, the birthday boy was overjoyed and certainly couldn’t wait to dig in! As for myself, I definitely felt the satisfaction a baker experiences to see a well-received creation. It was well worth the effort, but I shall certainly be wiser with my next cake
Till then, toodles.
No Comments November 13th, 2009
